


You Didn't Need Me After All

by Briony



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, District 13, Hijacking, Hurt/Comfort, POV Peeta Mellark, Rebellion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-19 10:01:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3606045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Briony/pseuds/Briony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After being rescued from the Capitol, Peeta struggles to put together the shattered remnants of himself and come to terms with the fact that someone didn't need him after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a collection that focuses on Peeta's struggle with losing his memories and sense of self. While this particular work focuses mostly on Peeta in District 13, I have at least one other work in mind that will focus on Katniss's choices and feelings. Both stories will diverge from canon in that Katniss will not be sent out with squad 451 and will instead remain in District 13 until the surrender of the Capitol.

The world begins with sounds. Urgent voices, a flurry of footsteps, soft and rhythmic beeping, they flutter into my consciousness as though from far away. I am laying on something and my finger drags experimentally across the surface feeling the slight texture of a sheet. A bed. The thought coalesces in my mind feeling familiar and foreign at the same time.

I feel a hand take my arm, two fingers on the inside of my wrist. Bright lights in my eyes force me further into the harshness of reality and with a rush the world comes into focus. The bright lights in my eyes, the myriad of unfamiliar faces, conversations and sounds all around me, they are impossible to makes sense of. Hands are on me again and I am sitting upright. Questions are being asked, platitudes being spoken it is impossible to follow.

A door opens and everyone stops to look. I turn my head to follow their gaze and I see her. _Her_. My heart stops, my muscles freeze, and my mind goes blank with terror. But only for a moment because she is running towards me and I know that if I want to live, I must act.

I am on my feet, sweeping away doctors and nurses, my heart pounding painfully as it pumps frantically to provide me with the energy I so desperately need. I collide violently with her and my hands wrap greedily around her throat. My momentum knocks us down to the floor and her head bounces against the grey linoleum, but I force it back down. My hands squeeze tighter against her throat as her hands beat uselessly against my arms and through my terror I begin to feel exultation as her pulse begins to flutter weakly, as I watch the light begin to leave her terrified eyes. Then something smashes into my head and the world goes black.

* * *

The world begins with sound. The soft steady beeping that mimics my heart. The whirring and clicks of unknown machinery. I open my eyes and it is dim. Lights wink at me from the twilight like the fireflies from home and for a moment I feel safe. My eyes drag around the room. Over the needles and tubes in my arms, the machines and monitors surrounding my bed, the ominous black square along the side of the room.

A door opens and light spills into the darkness. I tense as a lone figure walks towards me. A woman; a nurse. Her face familiar enough that it triggers the memories from before, causing my heart to pound and my stomach to churn. I reach out to grasp her arm when she comes closer to me. The restriction of the shackle causes momentary confusion, but its not important now. The only thing important now is to know. I have to know.

"Did I do it? Is she dead?" I ask pleadingly. The nurse's look is unfathomable as she carefully removes my hand from her. "Please." I beg, but she only inserts something into the tube attached to my arm. As the darkness bleeds into my mind, I think I can see a hardness in her eyes, disgust in the curl of her lip, but I'm too far gone to make sense of it, or to even remember.

  

* * *

The world begins with sound. A name. My name. Peeta. Peeta Mellark. Someone is saying my name. I turn my head to an unknown man with brown hair and striking green eyes.

"Hello, Peeta." He greets me.

I squint my eyes trying to focus. "Hello." I say experimentally. He smiles reassuringly.

"Do you know where you are?" I shake my head. He tells me that I am in District 13. That I was rescued from the Capitol. That they are here to help me. That I am safe. My mind tries to absorb the meaning of his words, but becomes increasingly preoccupied with the unyielding bands of metal against my wrist and the flatness of the sheet where my prosthetic leg is supposed to be. I pull against the shackle and the bite of it into my wrist is unnerving. I pull harder, again and again, but each time is unyielding and every jolt of pain transforms itself into panic.

"It's okay, Peeta, calm down." I hear the man next to me say, but I cannot calm down not when I know she could be nearby. Machines begin to beep in alarm and I turn to him desperately. "Is she here?" I ask. But he does not answer. A look of unease settles across his face. I am straining against the shackles now, but they are intractable, and I know in that moment I am trapped. I cannot run, I cannot fight. I know she is here and there isn't much time. I turn to this man whose face seems kind, in whose eyes there is a faint glint of pity, and I use the only tool I have left.

"Please." I beg. "Please don't let her hurt me." The words are a whisper, a prayer of desperation, and the heat of moisture rolling down my cheeks exist only to exacerbate my fear. I wait in anticipation for his response.

"Everything is going to be okay, Peeta. Katniss doesn't..." But all I hear is her name and whatever shred of hope I had been holding onto slips through my fingers like sand. I begin to scream. I thrash and pull against those cold metal bands until red begins to mix with the white of the sheets. Until a flush of cool liquid enters my veins and my mind goes black once more.

* * *

The world begins with dread. I come to in the same bed, the same room, the same sounds. I move my wrists tentatively and the same cold metal presses against my now bandaged wrists with a sharp pain. The sheet is still flat where my leg should be. She is here and they will not help me. I take deep breaths and try to calm myself. Will myself to regain control, to somehow prepare myself for the onslaught of pain and possible death that will come. It feels familiar, as though I've been here before or somewhere like here.

I wait and I wait, but nothing happens. Agitation fueled by apprehension floods my body with a desire to move, but I am unwilling to attract unwanted attention. I hold my hands in my lap and rub my fingers together nervously trying to suppress the futile urge to scream and fight against my fetters.

The door opens and I jerk slightly my eyes darting over the small figure coming through the door. A girl. Her blond hair, blue eyes, and round smiling face sparks a memory deep inside of me but it flutters around my head just out of reach.

"Peeta? It's Delly. From home." _Home._ Flashes of the bakery, of rolling and kneading bread with my father and brothers flood into my mind and she is there too. We are young, playing games, rushing down the streets with laughter on our lips. I feel a flush of relief.

"Delly? Delly. It's you." I grasp onto the memories of her and our childhood and cling tightly.

"Yes! How do you feel?" She asks. I look around the room waiting for something bad to happen, but nothing does. I am safe. For now...

"Awful. Where are we? What's happened?" Delly shifts uncomfortably before responding.

"Well... We're in District Thirteen. We live here now." She says evasively.

"That's what those people have been saying. But it makes no sense. Why aren't we home?" I ask because I desperately want to be home and for this nightmare to be over. Delly is biting her lip and looking at the floor.

"There was... an accident. I miss home badly, too. I was only just thinking about those chalk drawings we used to do on the paving stones. Yours were so wonderful.  Remember when you made each one a different animal?"  She's avoiding the subject I think with irritation.

"Yeah. Pigs and cats and things. You said... about an accident?" I press.

"It was bad. No one... could stay, but I know you're going to like it here, Peeta. The people have been really nice to us. There's always food and clean clothes, and school's much more interesting." She prattles on and I feel my frustration and confusion mounting. What does she mean us? Is everyone from District 12 here? If that's the case, then I could be safe! Surely, my family and my friends wouldn't let her hurt me. Why aren't they here?

"Why hasn't my family come to see me?" I ask and my heart plunges as the tears build in her eyes.

"They can't. A lot of people didn't get out of Twelve. So we'll need to make a new life here. I'm sure they could use a good baker. Do you remember when your father used to let us make dough and girl boys?" She asks. And I do, but the memory only wrenches painfully in my stomach because if what Delly is saying is true, then my father is dead and I am not safe. A flash of conversations and images of bombs erupting into blossoms of fire skitter through my head.

"There was a fire." I say abruptly

"Yes." Delly confirms in a whisper as tears stream steadily down her face.

"Twelve burned down, didn't it? Because of her. Because of Katniss!" My agitation is irrepressible and my fear has turned to anger. But it quickly evaporates into desperation. We have to get out of here. I'm about to ask her to remove the shackles so that we can run, but pull up short at Delly's next words.

"Oh, no, Peeta. It wasn't her fault." She sniffs and I stare at her in disbelief.

"Did She tell you that?" I hiss unable to contain the venom in my voice. Delly is protesting, but I don't hear her. She's here and she's telling them lies. If they believe her she will destroy them just like she destroyed 12 and my family. My family, my friends, my home... Delly! I have to warn her. And I do, but someone pulls her out of the room and no one is left to hear my screams, but I scream anyways. They have to know. They have to know before its too late.

* * *

I wait for my death. I wait for her to come to me, to gloat over me before she finally ends my life. But she doesn't come and I know that it won't be enough for her to just kill me.  It wasn't enough in the arenas.  It's just a game she likes to play.

The waiting is unbearable. My heart thrashes wildly and painfully in my chest and I can't breathe. The machines shriek in response. Doctors and nurses come in to check on me, I know all of them by their faces and all of them have the same look about them. Fear, disgust and morbid curiosity. I decide early on that she already has them under her control and I refuse to talk to them.  Why else would I be chained to my bed? But I can't stop the fear or the nausea that courses through my body when they come near me. Poking and prodding, inserting tubes, and changing bandages.

"He's going to give himself a heart attack." I hear one nurse mutter as my heart pounds painfully in my chest and the heart monitor beeps urgently at her. It is only quelled by the cool rush of morphling. And soon my life becomes a haze of awakenings and tiny deaths.  I begin to see real concern in the eyes of my wardens, but not for me. They're only concerned about one thing. They're only concerned about her.

I know this when they begin to show me the videos. Images of me and her, that I know are not true. They supplement their perverse charade with lies and exhortations. I yell and scream at them. My heart palpitating painfully at the mere sight of her, my stomach threatening to eject what little sustenance they have been able to force down my throat. My mind races as it tries to figure out what they could possibly gain by trying to convince me that she is anything else than what I know her to be. A mutt. A filthy dirty mutt.

But they are undeterred and everything begins to bleed together. Every waking moment a new video and questions that they ask over and over again waiting for me to give them the answer that they want. But I can't. I can only scream until I feel the needle in my arm.

Then one day, before they start the video, before I begin to scream, they inject me with morphling but not enough to knock me out. My heart slows, and I can breath normally again. I watch a filthy and wounded version of myself lying in a cave. I watch as she takes care of me. Checks my head for fever then puts cool cloths over my forehead. I ask her to tell me a story and she does. It's about her sister and a goat. I watch as she recounts the story, feel strange at the way the me in the video looks at her with besotted eyes. She finishes her story and I'm teasing her and she's smiling in response.

"Well, it wouldn't dare do anything else after you saved its life. I intend to do the same thing." I hear myself say and confusion begins to penetrate the calm.

"Really? What did you cost me again?" she asks and my mind reels at the subtle shyness in her words.

"A lot of trouble. Don't worry. You'll get it all back." The other me assures her gallantly.

"You're not making any sense..."

The video stops and a room full of people are looking at me expectantly. I can't seem to focus on a single thought. Everything feels surreal and faded. I know its a lie, but I can feel my certainty fissure under the weight of something I can't even begin to describe. My brain feels full and heavy. Strange feelings that are not my own are rolling through my body. I blink. Try to form words, but the only thing I can hold onto is the image of a goat with a pink ribbon around its neck kissing a young girl's cheek in front of a cozy fire.

When I come to, I turn my eyes to a nurse. No. Not a nurse, she is too young. I do not recognize her and yet there's something about her. She smiles gently at me and I blurt out the first thing that comes into my mind.

"Did the goat make it?" I ask. The smile vanishes and her eyes become watery as she silently shakes her head. Her distress bothers me and it takes me a moment to figure out why. Because it's genuine, I realize and without thinking I reach out my hand towards her. She doesn't flinch, she takes my hand and squeezes mine back in comfort.

I stare at her feeling as though there is something I am missing. I take in her features, clear blue eyes, straight blond hair plaited in a single braid hanging over her shoulder. Merchant, I think vaguely, but there's something about her nose and her eyes that tells me there's more. I have seen her before, but not in town. A face pressed up against the window of the bakery, timid steps as she walks down the path towards Effie's garish face, giggling as she reaches into a bag of peppermints that I have just tossed to her. But she's accompanied by a shadow. A dark ominous thing that hovers at the edge of my memory and sends a feeling of disquietude through me. She must see it in my eyes when I finally put it all together.

"Prim." I state and she watches me closely removing her hand from mine and waiting. I can feel the familiar flush and chill of sweat breaking out across my body. My exhausted heart begrudgingly beginning to race once more as I look for the shadow that I know must be around somewhere. Because they are inexplicably linked. This young girl and the other. Light and dark. Life and death. Two halves of a whole. My head aches trying to make sense of it all. There's something my mind wants to tell me. Something to do with Katniss and Prim, but it can't break free. I am beginning to shake now, my surroundings beginning to disintegrate in my fear.

"Katniss..." I croak out surprised that I can actually say her name. Prim shushes me and pushes my hair back from my forehead.

"It's okay, Peeta. She's not here. She's not going to hurt you." She says calmly. I fix my eyes on hers intensely, blue on blue, to look for a lie and find none. "You're having a panic attack." she continues calmly stroking my arm. "Take deep breaths. In and out." She shows me by inhaling and exhaling herself. I follow her example feeling my heart begin to stabilize and my muscles to relax. But no amount of breathing can seem to stop the tears.

"I... I don't understand. Why does she hate me so much?" I ask miserably. Prim purses her lips.

"Katniss doesn't hate you." Prim replies and I flinch at her name.

"Why are you helping me? It'll only make her angry." I continue. Prim folds her arms onto her lap.

"I want to help you, Peeta. We all do." There's a part of me that is screaming at me that she is lying that this is a trick.  But there is another part that is urging me to believe her. No, not believe her. There is something... and then it clicks in my mind and I know what I have to do.

"Promise me! Promise me that you won't let her hurt me! If you really want to help me, you have to promise." I implore her frantically. Confusion mars her face. "Promise!" I insist.

She makes a sound of exasperation. "Okay Peeta, I promise I won't let Katniss do anything to hurt you." I give her a piercing stare and she holds my gaze.

"Good."  I say relaxing back onto the bed.  "Because she'd do anything for you."


	2. I Must Have Loved You A Lot

The person staring back from the mirror is not me. At least not the way I remember myself. Even after the first games, when I had awoken emaciated and maimed, it was nothing like this. In front of me now is a wraith with sunken eyes, gaunt cheeks and pallid skin. Despite the thinness of its face, the neck looks too small to support it. Bones jut out from skin at sharp angles and I can count almost every rib until I reach the concave curvature of a sunken stomach. Thin arms. Thin legs. This is not the baker's son that could lift 100 pound sacs of flour with ease, or the victor who survived not one, but two Hunger Games. I don't know who this person is.

Still, some things are familiar. Like the blue of my eyes, or the shape of my nose and mouth, and my hands... They are the only remnants though, relics of a past life.

Littered across my body are other artifacts from another time that I am still trying to remember. Bruises, half healed cuts, persistent pain, fatigue, and curious little puncture wounds that travel along my veins in patterns that remind me of constellations in the night sky. It disturbs me that I cannot remember where they came from.

The doctors tell me I got them from the Capitol. That I was tortured first for information, and then later to hurt Katniss enough to prevent her from being the Mockingjay. The latter bit of information sent me into such a rage that I had to be sedated for an entire day.

Liars. All of them are liars. But I remember enough about the Capitol to know that they are probably right about what happened even if they are wrong about why. And despite the fact that I am constantly monitored, shackled and forced to do things against my will, they are at least providing me with food and medical attention. I sigh and bend over to rub the tender stump of my amputated leg before putting on a protective cover.

Of all the things they have done to subdue me in this awful place, the removal of my prosthetic leg has been the worst. Without it, I am truly helpless. I couldn't run even if they didn't have me continually shackled to my bed. But it's more than just losing my option to escape. After the first games, I had woken up in the Capitol with my prosthetic leg already integrated into my body and fully operational. With just a thought, it could move and I could still feel the world around me. It was as if I hadn't lost a leg at all.

Everyone had been so pleased. They took great pains to tell me how lucky I was to have my new leg. Top of the line the doctors assured me. Only the best for our victors Effie had cooed. The only person who had seemed upset was Katniss, but what can you expect from the person who threw me off the cornucopia into a pack of rabid mutts in the first place.

I learned later that prosthetics of this caliber were not usually given to Victors. That this was a special exception. It had apparently been donated from the manufacturer with the agreement that they would be able to use me in an advertising campaign. It was all done without my consent, but in my mind, It was a small price to pay.

Now that they've taken it away from me, I'm forced to face what I really am. A cripple. Powerless, broken, and terrified.

Leaning on my crutches to pull myself up, I limp my wasted body into the shower and turn on the tap. The water from the utilitarian shower head is barely warm. Tepid, much like the rest of this place. District 13. I have to reach deep into what's left of my memories to remember that this was the district that was supposed to have been destroyed by the Capitol 75 years ago during the Dark Days. Somehow they survived and now they, along with all the other districts are waging a war against the Capitol.

Except for District 12 which is now a pile of bones, rubble and ash. At least that's what I saw in that disgusting video where Katniss and Gale had walked around in it's remains. Where she'd had the audacity to sit in the ruins of my home and taunt me over my family's death. "There's no one left to hear you." She had said and the world had turned red.

If I could have, if I hadn't been strapped to my bed, if I'd had my leg, I would have thrown the holographic video across the room. And if she had been there, I would have throttled her all over again. Trapped as I was though, the only thing I could do was strain against the cuffs and scream obscenities at them until I eventually broke down crying. They sent Delly in and she held my hand tightly as my body shuddered with sobs and pitiful moans. I begged to go home, pleaded to see my family, only to have Delly remind me, through tears of her own, that there was no home or family to return to. District 13 was our home now.

Delly comes to visit me often. She's all smiles and optimistic words. We talk about our child hood. She tells me about her life in District 13. How she knows that I will like it here, once I get better. Her visits are like bright rays of sunshine breaking through an impenetrable grey. Delly is something I remember. Delly is safe. And her visits give me something to anchor to when the doctors began spewing their lies.

Prim is there now too. Though the doctor's were reluctant when she offered her assistance, they had relented when I asked specifically for her. She is my talisman. My amulet of protection. I remind her of her promise every day and although she presses her lips together in displeasure she always reassures me that she will keep it.

The water suddenly stops. Times is up. I exit the shower, taking care as I lean on my crutches not to slip on the wet tiled floor. A nurse, flanked by two guards, comes to check on and redress my wounds, then help me awkwardly into a gray hospital gown. After which they lead me back to my cell. I refuse to think of it as anything else.

It's a fairly standard hospital room. Gray linoleum floors, off-white walls. It carries an air of age and well use. My bed, where I spend most of my time, is centered on the far wall and surrounded by screens and medical equipment that hum and beep. But it's the large mirror along the side of the room that belies the true and menacing purpose of this room.

I scowl inwardly at once again having my pain and humiliation being shared with strangers for their what? Entertainment? No, not that. Rehabilitation they call it, but from what I can tell they are only interested in getting me to believe that I was in love with Katniss. That we are both victims in all this and that they want us to recover so we can help the war effort. By posing as lovers, just like we'd done for the Capitol, except they keep trying to tell me that it wasn't fake. That we did love each other and they just want to help me remember that. The whole thing is absurd.

Their persistence is maddening and I have no other recourse but to sit through it, but they can't make me believe it. Every fiber of my being tells me that they're wrong. I feel an impatient nudge from one of my guards and glare at him when he nods towards the bed. They help me as I gracelessly clamber onto the bed. I hold my arms out for them so that they can secure my restraints then wait patiently as the nurse reattaches me to the IV and heart rate monitor. When she's done, the guard nods to the mirror and soon the door opens and a group of doctors followed by Prim enter into my room.

"Hello Peeta." Dr. Reed, the head doctor, greets me with an optimistic look in his green eyes. He was the first doctor to speak to me when I arrived and has been working with me ever since. Behind him are the others.

Dr. Edwards, a stout and balding man with a black beard and mustache that reminds me of toned down version of Seneca Crane. He is something they call a neuroscientist which must have something to do with brains because his fascination with mine is only equaled with his frustration at not being able to peer inside of it. Apparently there are implants in my brain that help me operate my prosthetic leg and have prevented him from using all of his weird machines. Diagnostic tools, he calls them, but they have a sinister feel about them and the images of my brain that they create make me feel as though I've been violated.

Next to him is Dr. Rosenburg with her grey hair pulled back in a severe bun and her lips pinched in a thin line. An older woman, severe in her dress and countenance, I find that I mind her the least since she seems more like a regular doctor. Someone who's interested in healing my body rather than trying to pick away at my brain. She's at least mindful of the complications of having an amputated leg. Something even I hadn't had to deal with until now.  And at her insistence, I've been allowed to get up and move around frequently enough to prevent the pain and stiffness in my joints. She is also usually the one to stop the video treatments once the heart monitor hits a certain fevered pitch.

The others are all military types with shaved heads, rigid posture, and little patience. They are continually pushing the other doctors for faster and better results and are constantly being disappointed. Their barely masked frustration is one of the few things I find pleasure from in this bleak facility.

I return Dr. Reed's greeting and we begin. They always start by pulling the little machine that creates the holograms over my bed and showing me pictures of Katniss. When they first started doing this, I would cringe and try to look away. The mere sight of her would twist my stomach into knots and cause my heart to pound painfully in my chest suffusing my body with dread. But now, I can watch as they flip through multiple images of her dark and surly face without any fear. Instead all I feel is a pang of alarm followed by anger and hatred that flares dangerously whenever a picture features me and her together.  They seem to have an endless supply of images ranging from elaborate ball scenes where we are dressed stylishly and smiling happily to bloody and haggard pictures of us in a cave or sitting together on a beach. 

Once they are through with their images and satisfied that we can move on, I wait for their next round of abuses, but am pleasantly surprised when Dr. Reed suggests that I work on my time lines. I consent. It's a much more tolerable task than being forced to watch videos of Katniss and myself. 

At first, I was given a notebook of my own and asked to write the things I remembered in chronological order, but when they tried to refute every event I wrote down I finally snapped the pencil and ripped the notebook to shreds in frustration. Now they let me explain what really happened without contradiction while Prim writes down what I say and the doctors take their own notes. But they still furrow their brows and shake their heads when I explain how Katniss hunted me down and tried to drown me in the river or when she tried to kill me with some kind of poison one of her numerous sponsors had sent her to kill me with. 

"Why would she do any of that, when you were dying anyways?" Prim had burst out scornfully when I recounted this to them. The room had stilled as everyone paused apprehensively for my response. The shoulder's of the guards flanking my bed had tensed and a nurse had inched closer to my IV all of them waiting for me to lose it again so they could knock me out. But I had no response. Maybe it had to do with the fact that Prim rarely said anything during my previous tirades against her sister. Or that she never insisted that Katniss loved me the way Dr. Reed would. A comment like that from anyone else would have brought on at least a scathing remark if not a full blown paroxysm of rage, but instead all I could do was glare at her, stalling while my mind tried to find an answer. She had glared right back her blue eyes flashing and her face set with a stubborn defiance that was oddly familiar. 

The truth was, I didn't have an answer. The more we worked on the time lines and watched videos the more I began to notice things that I couldn't explain away. Things like: why didn't Katniss just leave me to die, or why did I volunteer for Haymitch during the second reaping? I had no strong love for Haymitch, so what could have possibly motivated me to do something like that? 

I come up with fantastical reasons. Katniss forced me to or I was coerced by the Capitol, but I have no memories of this and Katniss forcing me to volunteer feels like something I would remember. The more I try to rationalize these actions away the more crazy I begin to sound even to myself and it vexes me greatly. 

The time lines especially showed that there were large gaps that my memories couldn't account for. It seemed the only things I could remember with any clarity were times where Katniss or something else was trying to kill me. These memories are intense and highly detailed, but they are like little islands in a vast sea of time most of which I can't seem account for. If I concentrated hard enough, I could conjure up vague recollections of things that happened in between, but they always felt blurry and inconsequential. I sometimes wondered if they were even real. 

"Let's focus on the time between the games." Dr. Reed suggests. 

"Alright." I agree and wait as everyone settles in around me with ears at attention and pens poised. I clear my throat and try to remember, feeling slightly frustrated when I can only dredge up snapshots of memory instead of the cohesive record of events I feel I should be able to remember. "I spent a lot of time painting for my talent.  I had dinners with my family..." I trail off feeling like there should be more. "Then the Victory Tour happened." I add vaguely. 

"And what do you remember about that?" Dr. Reed prompts. I think for a few minutes. 

"I remember Effie being upset in District 11." I say then pause. "Someone got shot because of what Katniss said and then I was throwing things." I shake my head in irritation. "Reading the cards. Walking the train corridors at night. Lots of fancy parties." I watch as Prim makes a list of the things I say in her notebook. "The hob burned down. Gale got whipped. A lot of people got whipped, or put in the stocks. I remember they had one of the stockades right outside the bakery. Mom was really upset about it, said it drove away business..." 

"Did this happen during the victory tour or after?" Dr. Reed asks. I have to think about this for a minute. 

"After." I finally decide then pause for a minute as a new memory flashes into my mind, "I... made a lot of cheese buns?" I stammer out. "I don't even like cheese buns that much..." I mutter confusedly.

A small smirk flashes across Prim's face as she writes down cheese buns onto the paper. I almost ask her to explain it, but Dr. Reed redirects my attention. 

"Do you remember the reading of the card?" He asks. 

"Yeah." 

"What else do you remember?" 

"Volunteering for Haymitch. I don't know why though." I grumble bitterly to myself. No one tries to help me out. We've been over this before. I did it for Katniss. To save her life at the expense of my own. But this explanation is unacceptable to me and no one wants to risk setting me off by bringing it up again. Not when things have been going so well so far. 

We go over the time line together and I'm able to add a few more details, but nothing substantial. Nothing to account for the large empty swathes of time that I know deep down have some sort of significance. Dr. Reed assures me that given time, I'll begin to remember more. That it's normal after going through a trauma to forget things. "

No one can predict the effect the Tracker Jacker had on your brain, but the levels of it are dropping every day" Dr. Edwards adds. I can only nod in response torn between wanting to understand everything that has happened and terrified of what that might actually be. 

After a time the doctors get up and exit the room leaving just Prim and my guards.  They do this sometimes, after they noticed I was more cooperative when it was just Prim in the room.  Sometimes, I wonder myself, why I respond differently to her.  Less hostile, less likely to go berserk.  It's strange especially considering the way I feel about her sister.  But she's nothing like Katniss.  She's kind, and patient and calm in a way that makes her seem more mature than any 13 year old has any right to be and I can't help but want to trust her.  I look at her questioningly.   

"I asked them if I could show you this." She says reaching into a bag next to her chair. She pulls out an old rather large leather bound book and places it in my lap. When I look at her hesitantly she nods her permission. I gently open the book, noting the delicacy of the aged parchment. Inside are pages upon pages of drawings of plants along with information on where to find them, whether or not they're edible and if they have any medicinal uses. 

My eyes follow the lines of the ink drawings, appreciating the subtle curves of the leaves and admiring the colorful hues that fill the blossoms. I thumb through the pages aware of Prim's expectant gaze on my face and pause a smile pulling slightly at my lips. 

"Primrose." I read out loud as I lay down the book so we can both see the drawing of a small plant with delicate yellow flowers. "It means first rose because it is one of the first blooms of spring." I continue reading. It's impossible to ignore the blush on Prim's cheeks. 

"My father named me after them." She offers. "My Mom told me my Father brought them to her on the day I was born. He told her that when someone gives you Primroses it's a way of saying I can't live without you." Her voice trails off sadly. 

I'm touched by her willingness to share such a personal memory with me and dismayed when I see tears threatening to fall from her eyes. 

"Apparently you also make a good tea." I tease gently pointing to some writing further down the page. She laughs and wipes her eyes. Taking the book she flips to some of the newer drawings. 

"Do you remember drawing these?" She asks. I take the book from her and study the drawings. 

"No. Did I draw them?" 

"Yeah. Then Katniss would write in all the information. You guys spent hours working on some of them." I frown dubiously at the drawings trying to imagine Katniss and I working together on something so ordinary and finding it highly unlikely. No memory of it makes an appearance in my mind either, but the drawings do have a familiar feel about them and I enjoy looking at them. 

Prim sits quietly and patiently as I flip through the pages. After a time, I hand the book back to her. 

"I'm sorry Prim, but I don't remember working on this." She shrugs and puts the book back into her bag. "Why did you smile when I mentioned the cheese buns?" I ask. 

She almost rolls her eyes. "Because you used to bring them over every day." She says with a hint of exasperation. "For Katniss." She adds. "They were her favorite." I scowl slightly at this. 

"Did you like them?" I ask. 

"No, I preferred your sugar cookies with the frosting." She laughs. We grow silent for a while. 

"Sometimes it feels like everything I did was for Katniss." I say pensively. Prim sighs. 

"Yeah, it kind of was." She agrees then watches me to gauge my reaction, but I'm not angry, just deeply perturbed. The drawings, the book, the stupid cheese buns, they feel real. Not bright and focused like the memories of Katniss hurting me, yet more solid than the ambiguous flashes of memories that have been filtering their way into my consciousness. In any case, they don't feel forced upon me like the videos do. 

Over the next few days though, old memories begin to arrive, trickling into my brain with no rhyme or reason. It happens mostly late at night, when the lights have been turned down and I'm laying in my bed listening to the steady beep of my heart on the monitor. 

Most of them are from my childhood. Small things that must have seemed significant to me at the time. Fights with my brothers, scoring well on a math test, almost beating Rye in the wrestling championship, finding out Claire Thompson had a crush on me... I asked Delly about her, but she apparently didn't make it. 

Memories of my mother return. Her face red and angry in one memory then smiling and laughing in another. I remember the look of fierce pride she gave me when some officials from the Capitol had fawned over the the cakes I decorated and then the way she would hover over and berate me for every little mistake I made afterwards. 

And then I remember a cold rainy day and a girl sitting out by the apple tree soaked and despondent. I remember the way my mother hit me when I dropped the bread in the fire. The sting and burn of the insult juxtaposed against the bitter coldness of the rain as I threw the ruined loaves to the girl before retreating back inside. Watching her the next day, her arm around her sister, as she bends down and plucks something yellow from the green grass. 

I don't want to admit to myself who that girl was because its confusing and threatens to undermine the things I've been clinging to so desperately. But when they show me another video of Katniss and I in the cave yet again, and she begins to talk about it, about the bread and debts and owing, I know I can't deny it anymore. I tremble slightly as the walls of denial and anger that I had constructed to protect myself begin to fracture and splinter around me as I listen to her ask the question that's raging around in my own head. 

"Why did you anyway?" She asks. 

"Why? You know why." My own words taunt me. But even if I don't remember what I meant when I said those words it's not hard to figure it out. If I allow myself for a moment to believe that what these videos and doctors are showing me are true. If the bread, and the cheese buns, and the plant book really happened then there's no other explanation. 

I must have loved Katniss Everdeen. I must have loved her a lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think. I love to read comments and discuss things. :)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. I love to read comments and appreciate any feedback you guys are willing to give me. :)


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